We’ve decided to cut the remainder of our trip a bit shorter than originally planned, removing several destinations in China and Japan from the itinerary. We’re running out of time, energy, and money, all at the same time. It’s been a wonderful trip, but all things must come to an end. China is so huge that we were never going to do a very full job of it, but instead of visiting Guilin and Xi’an like originally planned, we’re going straight to Shanghai. Then will pass through Beijing briefly and home via Japan. Due to the nature of our tickets, we can change the dates of our flights but not the itinerary, so we’ll still be flying back through Japan but not spending any real time there.
Shanghai has always been China’s most westernized city and the architecture of the Bund area clearly reflects that. Built in the early part of the century, this strip of buildings along the Huangpu River are straight out of Europe and America. You can see Art Deco masterpieces, Neo-Classical and Gothic buildings standing next to one another. This area has been heavily redeveloped recently, restoring the buildings to their former glory and installing in them the latest fashion houses out of France and Italy. Across the river is Pudong, the financial center of China, with its crazy architecture and neon lights. Along the river on the Shanghai side is a river walk that was so crowded every time we tried to walk along it that we eventually decided it wasn’t worth it, no matter how nice the views might be.
Along with the architecture, Shanghai also embraced capitalism from the West early on. Although this meant that it was a second class city for many years, snubbed by the Communist leadership, Shanghai has now reemerged as the financial and commercial center of China. Walking down Nanjing or Huaihai roads, no one can doubt how thoroughly China has opened up to capitalism. Amazingly, the crackdown on illegal knockoffs of western goods seems to be making a difference. Although people will still grab you on the street and offer bootleg DVDs and jeans, the infamous Xiangyang Lu Market has been shut down and hasn’t reopened, as have most of the stores containing similar goods. In their places are stores like Li Ning, featuring shoes, clothing, and sports stars all copied directly from Nike. Even their symbol is very swoosh-like. Shockingly, the prices at Li Ning are also very Nike-esque, leaving me wondering what their competitive advantage is supposed to be.
After how good the Hong Kong Art Museum was, we didn’t have very high expectations for the Shanghai Art Museum. But given the glowing recommendations we figured it was worth a shot, especially since it’s free. Much to our surprise, the quality of works there was even higher than those in Hong Kong, and there was so much on display that we had to come back a second day in order to see everything. The display on the clothing and ceremonial wear of the ethnic minorities was beautiful, although it certainly felt duplicitous to praise their arts while suppressing their culture and religion. Such thoughts came to mind frequently, such as when walking down Tibet road or having the Great Firewall disrupt our web surfing.
Despite what the guidebooks said, Shanghai proved to be a nice walking city. There is a long stretch of public parks along one of the main east-west thoroughfares, there are large sidewalks in most parts of the city, and there is even a section of the city with nice cafes. You have to be careful of people spitting (still a national pastime), and the beggars have unusual tactics (yanking on your arm and shouting “MONEY”), but it’s a pleasant city to explore.
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